NAIA: A tragedy waiting to happen

The crash of an Airbus 320 in the congested airport of Congonhas in the Brazilian city of Sao Paolo has been described by a number of news reports as a tragedy that had been waiting to happen. That reminded me of NAIA. All the elements are there… less than adequate runway, congestion and third world airport management.

Consider this excerpt from that LA Times report: “Others said that when Congonhas was built in the early part of the 20th century, the surrounding area was mainly open land. Today, the airport is surrounded by high rises, adding another challenge for pilots.”

Now that our own domestic airline industry has invested heavily in about 20 new Airbus 320s, I can just imagine the strain in the capability of NAIA to handle all that increased air traffic. That’s why flights are now almost always delayed, according to the airlines.

By sheer serendipity, the foreign chambers of commerce two weeks ago, came up with a well researched position paper calling government’s attention to the inadequacies of our airports, principally NAIA. If Ate Glue is really into infrastructure building and really wants to impress tourists and investors, she need not go further than our airports.

The foreign chambers worry that “NAIA suffers from two very serious constraints: (a) runway safety and capacity and (b) antiquated terminal facilities.” More specifically, “Runway restrictions limit its capacity to handle flights (now allowed to land 22 hours each day from 4 a.m. to 2 a.m.).”

All three of NAIA’s operating terminals are being used beyond original design capacity, the foreign chambers observe. The old domestic terminal handled three million passengers in 2006, above its design capacity of 2.5 million passengers. There are peak periods when the three operating terminals at NAIA are extremely crowded, creating negative impressions for travelers who are used to the modern, efficient facilities built in most Asian cities over the last decade.

The foreign chambers however assert that more problematic than the passenger terminals are serious and immediate constraints to runway capacity and safety. The runways’ design is now well below standards for new generation aircraft, creating serious potential safety concerns. For example, distances between the centerline of runways and centerlines of taxiways do not meet the new International Civil Aviation Organization criteria, the UN body that supervises international aviation regulation and standards.

“The International Runway (called 06-24) was built in the 1940s when the biggest aircraft carried no more than 50 tons. Today an average B747 weighs 350 to 400 tons. With a single runway carrying the entire burden of all international flights, the runway requires heavy maintenance, which affects airline schedules and airport revenue.

“At the best-managed airports such as Hong Kong, Heathrow and JFK, planes can land at a rate of every 3 minutes or 20 an hour during any weather or light conditions. Based on current arrivals and departures, NAIA’s International Runway can accommodate only 15 flights per hour (taking off or landing) during bad weather or at night.

“With current annual growth in total passenger throughput above 10 percent, the runway capacity will reach its limits about the same time that all NAIA terminals including NAIA 3 reach their combined full capacity. In other words, very soon and as early as 2010 NAIA will probably not be able to take additional flights.”

As for the terminals, the foreign chambers echoed what I have been saying in this column about the horrible condition of the domestic terminal. “ The ‘old’ domestic terminal is totally out of date, with only one passenger entrance, two security machines and no air bridges. There are often long lines of departing and arriving passengers outside the terminal exposed to the elements, while passengers bump into each other and their baggage in security, check-in and terminal fee lines inside. Most tourists traveling to the popular tourist destination of Boracay must experience the quite negative experience of going through this completely retrograde facility which should have been closed when Terminal 2 opened.”

As for Terminal 1… it “is almost 30 years old and is a growing maintenance challenge. At peak hours, it experiences severe traffic and overcrowding with long delays while cars inch through departure and arrival areas.”

The foreign chambers see little hope for NAIA. “New runways cannot be added at NAIA nor can the airport be closed to allow construction of an international runway meeting current international weight standards. When the airport’s runway capacity is met in three years (at current growth rates) it will be important that an alternative airport to NAIA is available for air travelers in Central Luzon.”  

This is why, as I wrote here the other week, government should speed up plans to make the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport in Clark the new main airport to service the National Capital Region. This means upgrading its terminal and also most importantly, getting serious about putting up a high speed rail connection to Metro Manila.

As the foreign chambers noted, “Clark lacks adequate domestic and international terminals and its ground transportation links to Manila are subject to congestion. Clark is about the same distance from the capital as the expensive new international airports and terminals built in recent years in Korea and Malaysia at some distance from city centers, which have highly efficient ground transportation links. For example, the high-speed train connecting Kuala Lumpur to its new international airport travels 57 kilometers in 30 minutes.”

The foreign chambers feel “a high-speed rail connection between Metro Manila and Clark will be essential. There will be many challenges, such as design, routing, terminal locations, technology, funding and construction, but such a multi-billion project is essential for future development and needs to be a core element in the Central Luzon Air and Sea Logistics Hub Master Plan. Extending the MRT-3 and LRT-1 up to NLEX must also be considered in order to allow efficient access to the NCR light rail system.”

The foreign chambers also see the need to construct another runway at Clark. “Runway 02 R/20 L needs an additional parallel runway as an alternative runway as well as to allow eventual dual simultaneous operations. Runway 02 L/20 R can not be used by any aircraft because of the “crocodile cracks” which appeared on it after the Mt. Pinatubo eruption. The construction of a runway takes two to three years, after a planning and bidding period of two to three years.”

If all that Ate Glue ends up doing in her last three years to make sure we have these basic airport facilities, she would already leave very concrete accomplishments behind. If she sees no urgency and we end up having our own Cogonhas tragedy at NAIA, she could well be blamed for doing nothing much to prevent a tragedy that was clearly just waiting to happen.

 Postal bank

Romy Reyes, a colleague at the Tuesday Club, talked to me to explain that the bank director who filed questionable liquidation receipts that were disallowed by COA is no longer with the bank. Also, he clarified that the rest of the money cited in the report really covers their P10,000 a month director’s allowance, which he said is a pittance as bank directors’ allowances go.

 Half price

The new airline introduced a special half fare for wives who accompanied their husbands on business trips. Expecting valuable testimonials, the PR department sent out letters to all the wives of businessmen who had used the special rates, asking how they enjoyed their trip.

Letters are still pouring in asking, “What trip?”

Boo Chanco ‘s e-mail address is [email protected]